"Rise and shine Gentlemen! We got a mission." Sarges voice boomed. Everyone was up and alert. We all sat in our beds and looked at Sarge.
"Suit up!" he said as everyone got up. I looked at the clock it was 2 AM, and I was exhausted but this is what a Marine does. Sarge walked over to me as I got out of bed and headed to the locker rooms.
"Maddie are you sure your up to this?" he asked.
"Sarge, your already a man short. You need me." I said.
"Are you physically able to preform the tasks you need to?" he asked.
"Yes, sir." I said and he let me go to the locker room to get suited up. By the time I was done changing, everyone was on their way out the door. I was running behind so I grabbed my bag and ran out the door. The helicopter was up and running and they were waiting for me. The pain in my leg was begging me to stop but I pushed myself to the door. I sat in between John and Goat.
"OK, gentlemen at 0100 hours a Tsunami hit Thailand. I know this is not our norm, but we have been requested, just in case riots break out. Any questions? OK." Sarge said and sat down.
No one said anything and we were off. We flew in silence, somewhat awkwardly.
…...
By 0600 hours (6:00AM) we touched down on Thailand's ground. The sun was beginning to come up exposing the damage that the Tsunami had done. Even through all of my training I had never had to go to a natural disaster area. I had seen pictures on the news of previous ones but nothing compared to what I saw now.
Tree's were blown over, people were screaming, flooding was horrible, the dead bodies of animals and humans floating in the water. It was almost unbearable. We were here to help people and make sure when the riots start, they wouldn't get out of hand.
We walked along what was left of the main road, since it was the only one that was minimally flooded. The water came up just above my boot, I was certain the further you went closer to the beach the deeper it got. We walked through the town, people lined the main road gathering children and loved ones. Some crying not being able to find them. It was so heartbreaking.
"OK men, we will station here." Sarge's voice boomed through the town. I was so distracted, I didn't realized the water level was reduced to a puddle here and there and we were in the center of a 'shopping mall' in the middle of the town. We stood around as Sarge talked to the main person of the town. Don't know what exactly you would call him, mayor, representative, president, head honcho? I don't know.
"Maddie, Reaper, Duke." Sarge said we all ran over.
"You three go and help the wounded the best you can. Ask people of they need assistance and what not." he said. It was one of those laid back missions. I could tell by the way Sarge was acting.
We all nodded and said 'yes, sir' and we were off in the direction we had come. I could hear Sarge barking orders at everyone else. We all had medical training, but the reason he sent John, Duke and I was because John and I had the most and were sent in the worse direction of the damage. Duke came along cause he was close to knowing as much as we did.
We walked back into the coast town. The water level was up to are calves. There were some people standing in the water, trying to move it back into the ocean.
"Sir, can you please go to shore?" Duke said. We couldn't have people hanging around in this water. Soon it would be full of diseases and all sorts of nasty stuff. The man looked up and started talking in the native language. We advised him the best we could to go to shore. He eventually complied.
We looked up and down the area trying to see if there were any other people. It appeared that there was no one else in the water, alive anyway. The sun started to go up and heat up the land. By noon the smell would be horrible. We started from where we found the man in the water and worked our way up. Knocking on each door, evacuating people and asking if they were injured.
As the water lowered down to our ankles, that's when things got interesting.
"Excuse me, we are from the United States Marines, could you please come out of your house for your own safety?" I asked knocking on the door. This was the drill. Duke and I were on either side of the street knocking on every door asking this question. Reaper in the middle of the street in case one of us needed him.
"Hello?" I asked, I didn't get an answer. This was the only house I hadn't gotten an answer out of someone. I looked over at Reaper not sure of what to do.
"Just go on to the next house." he said. I could see the sweat trickling down his brow in the sunlight. It was about 11 o clock, and it felt like it was 120 degrees with humidity. I nodded and was about to go then I heard a crash in the house. I looked back at Reaper, he had heard it too. He walked towards the door and knocked.
"U.S. Marines open up!" he said, his voice booming through that part of town. Still no answer. He took out his weapon and got it ready. He looked at me and nodded. I busted down the door. The smell was the first thing to hit us. There were only two small windows in this house, and about 5 dead bodies. I gagged, not used to the smell, so did Reaper. It was a family, the mother was holding two of her girls still. The father was lying on the ground. The little boy was lying in between the mother and father.
Reaper and I stood in silence, in shock of the view in front of us. The water was at least 5-6 feet at this level, during the storm. They couldn't get out of the windows because they were too small and the door was jammed by the rushing water. They had drowned, trapped in their own house.
Neither one of us moved or said a thing. We were in shock at what we saw. The reality kicked in, we had heard a noise and we came in here to inspect it. I looked at Reaper as he looked at me, we both had confused expressions on our faces. That's when the noise happened again. My attention was kicked back into full mode. We both looked around on high alert we didn't hear anything.
GGGGRRRRRRRRRRR!
I heard a noise to the left of me, knowing what the sound was I tensed up. My breathing became eradicated and started to hyperventilate. I slowly looked to my left and saw my worst nightmare. It was someone's pet dog, obviously not a local animal.
"J-J-John." was all I could say, I was so scared of big dogs.
"Just don't move." he said perfectly calm. He moved a little to my side so he could get a better view. That's when I saw another body in the room. The dog had been feasting upon another family member. Once it saw Reaper move it began to growl and snarl. I tensed up even more, with goosebumps running up and down my spin. Reaper began to slowly lift his arm, that still held his weapon. The dog growled even more and moved a step towards us. I didn't even budge. Reapers gun went off with a boom. The Dog went down, he shot him right in the head. My body relaxed a little.
"Contact report!" Sarge's voice boomed through our radios.
"A dog, sir. Appears to be sick, possibly with rabies. Keep a look out." Reaper said, as we both bent down and looked at the dog. I could hear Duke run in and gasp at the sight. Reaper and I just continued to look at the dog. It was an older dog, who had probably swam in here through one of the windows during the flooding. I looked around and saw he probably stood on a cabinet they had and waited for the water to go down. The dog was sick though. He had some sort of red mucous dripping from his jawline, not to mention some white foam.
"Hey, you OK?" Reaper asked as we both looked at the dog. My attention snapped up to him and I looked him right in the face.
"Ya, sorry that I froze, sir." I said. "I don't like dogs." I said in a whisper and looked back down at the dog. I could see him nod in the corner of my eye.
"Neither do I." Duke said under his breath.
"Let's keep going." he said, and stood up. We walked out of the house and closed the door. Duke attached a bio hazard sign, so when the proper people came they would know of the dead bodies.
We continued down the next couple of houses we had left then joined back up with everyone else. We gave Sarge our reports. We now got to stick around and wait for riots to start.